Dallas Mavericks Blog

Shortly after the Mavericks won the NBA championship, coach Rick Carlisle was talking about the future and confessed that he was “probably going to lose Dwane to Toronto.”

That would be assistant coach and defensive architect Dwane Casey, who appears to be the top target of the Raptors to fill their coaching position, vacated when the team parted ways with Jay Triano.

Casey met with the Raptors for a second time this week after the championship and he and Boston assistant Lawrence Frank have been the finalists since the Raptors pared down their list of candidates. Casey said before Thursday’s parade that he didn’t want to comment on the situation. “Let’s just see where it goes,” he said.

Casey has been Carlisle’s assistant and defensive coordinator for three years and the Mavericks’ success defensively in the playoffs and the entire season has made him a hot commodity. Every team that has had a coaching opening has contacted him this season and he was a finalist in Houston before Kevin McHale got that job.

Defensive-minded coaches are the rage these days in the NBA and Carlisle has said numerous times that he’s amazed Casey hasn’t already moved on to a head-coaching position, which would be his second stint in the big chair after leading Minnesota in 2006-07.